by Eric Flint
His first words were meaningless to Aille. "Jesus H. Christ." Thereafter, his speech became more coherent, although he continued to pepper his words with that same peculiar phrase. Aille was only able to grasp a portion of what he was saying, in any event.
"—called 'demonstrations,' sir—also 'rallies'—and they're an ancient human custom—"
Here came some meaningless words involving the complicated history of something called "bill of rights" and "petition in redress of grievances."
"—though this isn't that kind of rally, sir, but what you'd call a 'demonstration in support'—that's obvious not only from the banners and placards but the nature of the speeches—"
Yaut was starting to look as if he were about to apply vigorous wrem-fa, whether or not the human scholar would respond to it. He was not, in some respects, the most patient of fraghta. Aille decided to forestall him.
"Scholar Kinsey! Most of your words are sheer gibberish to me. Simply explain one thing: what is the import of all this?"
"Oh." Kinsey rubbed his face with his hand, a peculiar gesture Aille has noted before on several humans. Tentatively, he thought it was the approximate human equivalent of singleminded-concentration. "Well, sir, the gist of it is that it looks as if the human race—most of them anyway—has adopted you as their new hero. And Pluthrak as its—the word we'd probably use is 'champion' or 'party of preference,' terms which have no direct Jao analogue so far as I know."
He pointed at one of the images in the holo tank. It was that of a young human male with a strange mask on his face, covering his eyes except for slits. "But it's mostly in support of you, personally. Humans like to personify abstractions."
Aille thought back to his first time on Terra, when Aguilera had tried to explain to him why humans would give gender to weapons. "Yes, I have seen that. But how does that young human's unusual head-covering—I see many others with the same—"
Understanding came to him, in a flash. He'd seen humans with those grotesque attempts to paint vai camiti on their faces, at the reception Oppuk had given him shortly after he arrived. For a moment, anger began to suffuse him—Yaut too, judging from the angle of his ears.
He restrained the anger, remembering Wrot. And softly repeated the old bauta's words aloud, as much for Yaut's benefit as his own. "Crude and coarse Wathnak may be, young Pluthrak, but I was taught even as a crecheling that to begin by assuming disrespect is a grave offense against association."
Yaut's whiskers quivered, but then his posture also reflected his ebbing indignation. "Yes. Here too, it seems."
Aille studied the images in the holo tank, giving particular attention to the human script on the multitude of banners and placards being carried in the demonstrations and rallies. Most of them were variations on the themes of "We Want Pluthrak"—that was clear enough—but there were also a number of inscriptions urging a long life upon Aille.
Bizarre, those were. A being lived as long as he or she did. Pure mysticism to think otherwise. What was important was to live with honor, and die well.
Still, he understood that the sentiment involved was favorable, however superstitiously worded. What disturbed him, however, were the large number of inscriptions which proffered great insult to Narvo. Some of them, he was quite sure, were outright curses.
"That must cease," he stated firmly. To one of the Jao techs: "I need to speak with Stockwell. The father, not the member of my service."
The techs were efficient. Very shortly, the image of the human administrator floated in the holo tanks. After Aille explained what he wanted, Stockwell's expression seemed dubious.
"I'll do what I can, sir, but I really don't control these demonstrations and rallies and marches. What you're seeing is pretty much a spontaneous outburst—all over the world, not just here in North America—in which twenty years of anger is erupting. Fortunately, most of it seems to have channeled into support for Pluthrak, and yourself. But the hatred for Oppuk, and all things Narvo, is by now bred into the bone on this planet."
The last expression was murky, although Aille understood the gist of it. Nor was he surprised. But still he pressed onward.
"It is essential to avoid insult to Narvo in this situation. I cannot emphasize—"
To his surprise, Yaut interrupted him. "Leave it be, youngster. You can no more prevent this than you can control this planet's orbital cycle. And, besides, you are worrying too much."
Aille stared at him, confused. It was normally a fraghta's duty, after all, to be the guardian of custom and propriety.
Yaut's whiskers bristled, his ears upraised and his stance proclaiming ferocity. "The Bond will arrive here before the Naukra. The Harriers are less concerned with propriety than the old kochanau. Much less. So let them see the hatred and rejection Narvo has created—and the alternative you have provided for association. It will do no harm, be sure of it."
* * *
A bit uncertainly, Aille deferred to Yaut's judgement. In any event, other and more pressing issues immediately came to the fore.
First, Tully sent a message. Wiley is willing to come to negotiate in person, if you will provide him a guarantee of safe conduct.
Again, Aille had to settle Yaut's outrage at the implied insult. Aille had studied more of human history than his fraghta, and understood that humans did not necessarily follow long-established Jao principles of honor in this matter. Not surprising, really. A species that could come up with the expression "killing the messenger" would hardly have the Jao automatic respect for envoys and negotiators.
But, no sooner did Aille assure Tully—and through him, Wiley—that his safety would be assured, than it was necessary to change the arrangements. As soon as Aille instructed Kralik to make the arrangements for the parley with Wiley, Kralik informed him that a new development had just occurred.
"We've got a problem, sir. Might be a major one. The Resistance in Texas has launched an uprising in Dallas and Fort Worth. I can't determine yet how much popular support they're getting from the citizens of the area, but they've got a number of combatants and seem to have seized at least part of both cities. My recommendation is . . . ah, perhaps a bit bold."
Aille's ears pitched forward in forthright-invitation. "Yes?"
"I think we need to smash this, immediately and as hard as possible. In other to do that, however, I'd have to order the entire Central Division into northern Texas—which would mean pulling the Second and Third Brigades out of Colorado and Utah. That would leave Wiley and his people unrestrained—and over half the shelters are located in that area of the continent. In the Rocky Mountains, I mean."
Aille saw immediately the logical end point of Kralik's proposal. So did Yaut.
"I agree," said the fraghta. "We may as well discover immediately if this Wiley human can behave honorably."
Aille nodded, a part of his mind interested to see how automatic that human gesture had become. "Do as you see fit, General Kralik. As a member of my service, you can speak with my authority."
* * *
After Kralik ended the holo transmission, he stared for a moment at the empty tank. "I'll say this for the Jao," he mused. "Pluthrak, anyway. They sure don't waste a lot of money on red tape."
He smiled crookedly and ordered the tech—a human one, this time, since it required human technology—to transmit a message back to Tully.
Change of plans. Resistance in Texas has launched a major assault in Dallas-Fort Worth. I intend to crush it, using the entire Central Division. With the authority vested in me by Aille krinnu ava Pluthrak, I am reinstating Colonel Rob Wiley back into military service, with the brevet rank of major general. He is now in command of the new Mountain Division, which consists of whatever forces he has. I will expect General Wiley to maintain order in the area and see to the safe and speedy transfer of as many children as possible into the Jao shelters in the Rockies.
Don't screw this up, Rob.
Tell him, Tully. Tell him.
Ed Kralik, Lt. General
>
* * *
In sultry Pascagoula, Rafe Aguilera found himself pacing the rows of the black submarines long after midnight. The immense building rang with the sounds of last-minute work. His shoulder still ached from the bullet he'd taken in Salem, however small caliber, but the base doctor said it was healing nicely. He stared up at the massive cradles, while the refit went on at a feverish pace that made the previous rate look like loafing.
Spotlights glared as another disemboweled tank was lowered onto a boomer by a massive overhead crane. The tank's drive engines had been removed and heavy-duty air-conditioning units hurriedly installed in the space left open.
In essence, what had been a tank was now a turret with a beefed-up environmental control system which—they hoped—would be enough to keep the crew alive during the coming battle. The forcefields would protect against the sun's heat and radiation, but only up to a point. What that point might be, no one knew—but the tanks, being the most exposed, would be the first to give way.
As soon as the hooktenders pronounced the tank settled into place, the welders swarmed over it and began to work. Meanwhile, working from within the submarine hulls, other technicians began installing the environmental and communication conduits and links.
Aguilera waved at one of the foremen, Scott Cupton, up on the scaffolding. "Hey, Scott, come down! I want to go over these specs with you."
Cupton waved back, dragged a forearm over his sweaty face, then began clambering down the ladder attached to the scaffolding.
Rafe Aguilera laughed. He was going to make this work, going to be "of use," as the Jao liked to put it—and it was such a rush, that, for just a second, he thought he finally understood how their furry brains worked. Sort of.
* * *
Early the next morning, before daylight had fully asserted itself, Aille wrapped up the final details of their pieced-together defense in Oppuk's command center in Oklahoma City, then piloted his courier ship back to Pascagoula. Yaut, Caitlin Stockwell, Wrot, and Willard Belk accompanied him.
Aille could feel the moment drawing near when they must take what assets they had gathered and launch for the system's framepoint. Events raced like the swift center current of an ever deepening river, a sure sign they must go soon.
He thought Oppuk must feel it too. All Jao must be aware how close the moment was. He wondered who among them were more nervous, humans stumbling through this timeblind, or the Jao, who knew only too well how short time was.
It was midmorning, as humans liked to term it, when his courier ship set down again on the tarmac at Pascagoula. He sat at the boards longer than necessary, relishing the feeling of the controls in his own hands. The sensation of his senses extended throughout the ship as though its hull were an extension of his own body. Sometimes he regretted that the needs of Pluthrak determined he would be of more use as a military officer rather than a pilot. He would have been satisfied to be no more.
A groundcar pulled up even before the five of them had time to descend the ramp. Aguilera jumped out, his face flushed with strong feeling. "Subcommandant!" he cried. "Come to the refit floor. I want you to see this!"
Caitlin and Wrot hastily stepped before Aille, as did Belk. Yaut's ears waggled at the unseemly exuberance of Aguilera's greeting, but Aille chose not to notice.
Aille slid into the vehicle, which was, as always, meant for lesser dimensions than his. Yaut squeezed in after him, but Caitlin balked. "There's not enough room for all of us, and this isn't my area of expertise anyway. With your permission, I'll catch up later."
"Nor is it mine," Belk said, his shoulders expressing polite-reticence quite well, for a human. "I will follow you to the refit facility."
Aguilera was strangely agitated, glancing from one to the other, his brown eyes dancing. Even Aille could decipher that much of his emotional state, though nothing more precise. The dark-haired human didn't even seem aware he had provided insufficient transport for Aille's party.
Caitlin, he was sure, wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to visit Kralik, who had come down here the night before. Belk, as always, was simply being practical.
"Yes, that seems sensible," Aille said.
Aguilera threw himself back into the front seat and motioned to the driver, a human female. "Take us to the refit floor and don't spare the ponies!"
Aille was still puzzling over exactly what "ponies" were and why he hadn't seen any up until now, when they pulled up before the huge, hangerlike building.
"Okay," Aguilera said, leaping out to open Aille's door before he could do it himself. "I wanted you to see this, now that we've gotten a number of them installed. I know it looks absolutely crazy, but I really think it will work."
Nath and Chul met them at the entrance, and they wound their way through the cradles holding the oblong, dull-black ships. The pace of work had heightened to what he might term a "frenzy." Lights gleamed, cables and power conduits snaked across the floor and up through the scaffolding. Humans scrambled over the great hulls, intent on different tasks, calling to one another. As they neared the first ship, Aille studied the tank being welded onto the back of the hull.
"What do you think?" Aguilera asked eagerly.
In truth, Aille did not know what to think. His ears waggled with baffled-indecision. It was one thing to hear a proposal this radical and quite another to see it brought into reality. He realized now he had not really understood Aguilera's idea, when the human had first described it. The ship looked so—misshapen, even ludicrous.
Chul sensed his unease. "It will work, I think, Subcommandant. There is no way to know until it is put to the test, of course, but if we can get close enough to the Ekhat ships, those tank guns should be able to do a lot of damage."
"Even in a star's photosphere," Aille murmured. It was not so much a question, or a protest, as a simple expression of wonder.
"It should work," Aguilera said forcefully. "We'll be armed with DU sabot rounds. Each one is fifteen kilos' worth of uranium driven by liquid propellant. The penetrators will be traveling more than a mile a second. We'll lose the outer layers in the heat, but enough should be left to punch holes in the Ekhat ships and wreak havoc inside. If nothing else, I'm thinking the sabot rounds should damage the Ekhat ships enough to let the sun's own heat do the rest. Those forcefields are essentially the same as yours—that's what Nath and Chul tell me—and they won't work all that well once the structural integrity of the hulls starts to weaken."
* * *
Later in the solar cycle, Aille convened a panel of Jao engineers recalled from bunkers to inspect the vessels. They looked askance at the Terran experts attending, but listened to Aguilera's ideas.
Most were skeptical, but agreed the tolerances and stress ratios were within the realm of achievability. It was estimated they had enough time available to outfit fourteen submarines, as well as the human crews needed to staff them. Pilots, though, were another matter. Humans had no real experience in flying spacecraft, even in ideal conditions much less the conditions that would exist within the sun's photosphere. So, although most of the crews would consist of humans, the pilots would need to be Jao.
Oppuk had taken the most experienced ones with him to lie in wait for the Ekhat. Thus far, Chul had only been able to find eight pilots skilled enough for the task—nine, counting Aille himself. Wrot suggested they recruit retired combat veterans who had made their homes on Terra, then volunteered to track them down.
"It must be soon," Aille told him. "Flow accelerates with every twitch of my skin. Do you feel it? They will come through in a few solar cycles, no more."
Sober-agreement stiffened Wrot's lines, then the old soldier disappeared into the base's comm center to reach out to all his old contacts.
* * *
Between the work of assembling the crews for the submarines and the sudden crisis in Texas, Kralik had gotten hardly any sleep for longer than he could remember.
Caitlin found him in the comm center, just having finished a
discussion with Major General Abbott, the commander of the Central Division. She touched his cheek with fingers like silk. "My God. You look half-dead."
"We'll all be dead if we're not ready before they open that framepoint," he said, but his own hand reached up to take hers. Her fingers were long and slim.
"You're off duty, mister," she said, "as of now."
With that, she dragged him back to his quarters where she fed him a ham sandwich, then closed the curtains and told him to lie down.
"I don't have time," he said wearily. "None of us do."
"You're not Jao," she said, "so you can't get by with a few hours of halfhearted dormancy like they do. You have to get some real sleep if you want to be any use when you launch."
She stifled his protests with a hand over his mouth and more-or-less forced him onto the cot. Then, after positioning a pillow behind his buzzing head, she stretched out beside him, pulling his arms around her.
She felt wonderful in his arms, her skin fragrant with scented soap, her hair like satin against his cheek. He closed his eyes, feeling as though he were sinking into a thick black fog. "Just a few minutes then," he murmured.
"Forget about that. You'll sleep as much as you need." She nestled against him. Her neck, her cheek, her throat, all were cool fire, and he recognized the scent she wore, juniper, like the high forests of New Mexico he'd roamed in his youth. "Forget everything, but here and now."
He tried to summon a suave leer. Clark Gable style.
"If that's supposed to be a leer," she chuckled, "you really need to get some sleep. I've had squirrels ogle me more lustily than that."
"S'just my nat'ral gentlemanliness. Your broken arm, y'know. I wouldn't feel right . . ."
* * *
He fell asleep in mid-sentence. Caitlin didn't get to sleep herself for two hours. The spartan cot put their bodies in very close proximity, and, even clothed—even with a splinted arm—she quickly found herself becoming very frustrated.
